Wednesday, December 17, 2014

According to reports from the Midlandsradio.fm, Offaly County Council has announced proposals for a walking and cycling path along the Grand Canal from the county boundary in the east to Shannon Harbour in the west and a plan to link in with the Dublin to Galway greenway.

A planning application for the first phase, running from Tullamore to Lough Boora Discovery Park, is expected to go out for public consultation in February with works due to begin in June if there are no hold-ups.While the cost has not been announced, it's hoped the local authority will be in a position to access national funding next year if the project is 'shovel ready'.A series of public meetings on the 'Greenways Strategy', which includes further pathways and plans to link in with the Dublin to Galway route, will be held next month in Tullamore, Birr, Lough Boora and Edenderry.Chief Executive of Waterways Ireland Dawn Livingstone, who attended the council's monthly meeting, explains how the county could benefit:

Monday, December 15, 2014

Reports in the longfordleader.ie tells how members of the Longford County Council heard from local tourism leaders that Longford will be uniquely positioned to benefit from an increased level of tourism from greenways and blueways.Seadna Ryan told members the work that had been done throughout the county with regard to walkways, cycle routes and water activities, would ensure that Longford would become a major attraction for tourists in the years ahead. Mr Ryan went on to tell local authority members that the Royal Canal Greenway went from Dublin to Clondra and that Clondra had also been included in the Shannon Blueway project. “This means that Longford is providing a very unique tourism product; if we copy cat we will not survive, but if we are distinct we will,” Mr Ryan continued.Longford is ideally placed to benefit from the proposed Dublin Galway greenway as its strategically positioned on a location between the proposed Dublin Galway greenway and the Mayo greenway and in time the option to connect these greenways could provide huge potential.

The Connacht Tribune reported last week on a meeting of farmers which discussed the Galway to Dublin greenway. The newspaper said that Galway IFA Chairman stated that there would be absolutely no cooperation from farmers for this project until the word CPO (compulsory purchase order) was taken off the agenda.“[CPOs have] involved ESB lines, gas pipeways and new roads but to destroy a commercial farm for a walkway is just something that farmers will not accept. This is not critical infrastructure and there are alternatives available,” said Pat Murphy, Galway IFA Chairman.The Connacht Tribune also reported that the Galway/Mayo IFA regional officer Roy O’Brien said: “It is quite simply, totally unacceptable that farmers could face into a situation where their lands could be dissected with this Greenway route. This would put some farmers out of business – an alternative route must be sourced, most probably along the side of the old N6 Galway to Dublin road.”The Irishcycle.com group have weighed in on the topic calling for farmers to engage with greenway planners and come to the discussions with an open mind

Ann Phelan TD (Labour), who is a minister for state at the departments agriculture and transport with special responsibility for rural economic development and rural transport, said that consideration must be given to land purchase by agreement, “or, if necessary, by CPO” for the proposed Dublin Galway greenway.

Phelan said: “In terms of the best land access models for greenway delivery, the use of publicly-owned land is advantageous from the perspective of reducing costs. Negotiated permissive access, from the perspective of cost and public ownership, continues to have value but for the projects of national scale, consideration must be given to land purchase by agreement or, if necessary, by CPO.”

She said that people only have to look at the success of the Great Western Greenway (shown in photos above and below) in County Mayo to see how facilities such as these can revitalise our rural areas by bringing new visitors from both home and abroad to areas of the countryside and towns along greenways.